Since you don't get 9.1 in well. I think you want only 9 deleted and record 29.1 or 9.2.

Sorry for the confusion, I get all the channels well, it was my mother in Eagan who has issues with 9.1(on VHF channel 9) who occasionally watches 9.2(on UHF channel 29), she doesn't own a DVDR.

Quote:

Originally Posted by PeterTheGeek

TPT 2 and KSTP 5 have similar issues in the MSP market.

I think you have your 29 information switched and it should be:
29.1 is HD MyTV on physical channel 29
29.2 is SD MyTV on physical channel 9

They would only pair a HD programming with a SD and not have two HD programming on one RF channel.

Of course you are correct, only one HD channel per channel, it's so confusing
I think I'll leave it as is, that is 29 unchecked which allows my daughter to timer record 29.1 and also 9.1
At least with the TPT channels one can program the physical channel numbers because they aren't actually used by any channels. Funny thing is other than these Funai DVDRs I haven't heard of any other tuner that has issues with our rather unorthodox channel numbering in the MSP market maybe it's related to the dual mode of these tuners??
Regardless everything seems to be working fine now

In my market both the FOX and MyTV channels are owned by the same company. The reason for the odd channel numbering is because physical channel 9 is on VHF and kind of spotty for digital TV. The channel owners figured if you couldn't get FOX HD on 9.1 that you could still get FOX SD on physical channel 29(mapped to 9.2). This is actually true, my mother(who is OTA) occasionally has problems with breakups on FOX 9 HD and when she does she just switches to FOX SD(9.2, physical channel 29) and her reception is perfect.
AFA deleting any channels, my daughter would probably want to record from both FOX and of course MyTV so I don't know what channels I would delete??

Antenna

Quote:

Originally Posted by jjeff

OK, I couldn't wait and kicked her off her new toy
First I went into analog mode, 9 and 29 were already deleted since those channels aren't active in analog land, so nothing I could do their. Next I I went into DTV and tried deleting 9. Typing 29.1 still resulted in going to 29.2(but didn't first try going to 29.1, it immediately went to 29.2). Finally I deleted 29(sounded counter intuitive to what I wanted to record but did it anyway) and wala, I could type in 29.1 and have it go to 29.1 HD! I did a quick timer test and sure enough if I left the tuner on another channel(used 5.1) it would change to 29.1 HD just fine. The only downside to this is she cannot use the CH UP or CH DOWN buttons to get to ANY of the 29s(29.1 or 29.2, it just skips over them) but we'll trade that off for the ability to actually record 29.1. Of course even though CH UP/CH DOWN won't access the 29s typing 29.1 in direct takes one to 29.1. On a funny note now, typing in 29.2 directly takes one to 29.1
You're a pro with these things Wajo, thanks!
...

For OTA, Philips and Magnavox DVDRs seem to struggle when multiple Physical channels are mapped to the same Virtual channel, which is what a TV displays. This problem first got discussed when a user was having trouble with the PBS stations in the MINNEAPOLIS/ST. PAUL market, which exhibit a similar problem. I don't recall posts from any other markets where OTA users have run into this issue.

I went to http://www.rabbitears.info/market.php which I have found to be a good source of information in the past and found the following entries.
09-1 9.3 720p DD5.1 KMSP-HD FOX "Fox 9 KMSP"
29-2 9.4 480i DD2.0 WFTC-SD MyN "My 29 WFTC"
09-2 29.4 480i (w) DD2.0 KMSP-SD FOX "Fox 9 KMSP"
29-1 29.3 720p DD2.0 WFTC-HD MyN "My 29 WFTC"
The first item is the virtual channel which is displayed by the TV and the second is the Physical channel.

With both 9 and 29 deleted from the DVDR channel list, she should be able to record MyTV HD by entering 29-3. If she wanted to record FOX SD, she should be able to enter 29-4. I believe that because there is no physical 29-1 or 29-2, when either of those channels are entered, the tuner grabs the lowest physical sub-channel which is 29-3, which displays as 29-1. I believe she should be able to record FOX HD by entering 9-3 and MyTV SD by entering 9-4.

Below are the entries for the PBS stations and another station which is involved in THAT puzzle. The DVDR channel scan will find Physical 23 first, so that is the first Physical channel it will associate with Virtual channel 2. Physical channel 34 will be found later in the scan. That is why channel up will show 2-3, 2-1, 2-2, 2-4. To reliably record all the Virtual Channel 2 PBS stations, I believe DVDR users will need to delete 2 and 23 from the DVDR channel list, and program by Physical channel numbers. The reason 23 would need to be deleted is that there is a Virtual channel 23, and if that is in the tables, it will block access to Physical channel 23. Using this work-around means that the Virtual channel 23 programs need to be accessed by their Physical channel 22 assignments.
02-1 34.3 1080i DD5.1 tpt 2 PBS "TPT 2"
02-2 34.4 480i DD2.0 tpt MN MN Channel "TPT MN"
02-4 34.6 480i DD2.0 tpt Wx Weather "TPT WX"
02-3 23.5 480i DD2.0 tptLife PBS "TPT Life"
17-2 23.7 480i DD2.0 MN Channel

Since I live in Denver Metro, I cannot test any of this. Currently, I do not have the situation where more than one Physical channel maps to a single display channel, although it may happen soon. One of the PBS station is supposed to be installing a repeater which my antenna should pick up. This still won't be the same as the MINNEAPOLIS/ST. PAUL market situation, since repeaters carry the very same digital stream as the main transmitter, and it does not matter which Physical channel the tuner is looking at. It will see exactly the same thing.

I replied to the OP before I saw your post. Sorry about duplicating some of your info. It is interesting that the Twin Cities have 3 stations doing this rather interesting channel mapping, and I don't recall seeing a similar complaint from any other market.

I wonder if the Twin Cities has a really clever consultant that works with multiple stations.

The OTA tuner philosophy used in this familiy of DVDRs does not handle this situation well. If the designers had anticipated that stations would do this, they could have avoided the problems by having 1 to 1 mapping between Virtual channel/sub-channel pairs and Physical channel/sub-channel pairs, but I believe that would have required a lot more rescans by typical users. Because of the approach they took, I have never had to rescan my units. Based on my glances at the ATSC specification, I would never have anticipated the Twin Cities situation. I certainly would never have expected engineers who have not spent time in the US to expect this situation either. I presume the Philips design was done in the Netherlands and relied on the ATSC standard.

Foreign designers might expect TV stations to comply with standards and that the FCC would actual make them do it. Anyone who has seen the messed up times in many stations PSIP information would realize that the FCC does not worry about such things.

That would be a good buy. I added a 100pF cap from the Shack and I'm still a few seconds a week fast. I left the leads long so I can add another cap with little effort. I paid $2 for two including tax but no shipping. My 2160A has always been good. The 515H not so much.

Before I discovered the post describing how bad Memorex DVD's were, I bought a 10-pak of DVD-R's at Walmart. Memorex is now the only brand they have on the shelf locally.

Has anyone else tried this media?

Long ago before I discovered quality and reliability varied widely and mattered a lot, I bought and burned several Memorex spools of 50 & 100. It's too soon to tell about longevity, but I don't plan to buy any more of them in -R.

WalMart here never has even close to the best blank DVD pricing. Typically if I can't wait I check for what's on sale at Staples and Office Depot. Otherwise I buy only -R TYG02 in 100 ct. cakeboxes from supermediastore.com, and usually I can wait.

variations do NOT appear to be very linear, as indicated by the difference in values required between the 513 & 3576 #1, and 3576 #2...

i'm currently in test with my 3rd 3576 and will advise what i end up with on that one...

a reasonable source for capacitors would be digi-key ( digikey.com ) or maybe mouser electronics ( mouserelectronics.com )... and if you wanted to minimize temperature sensitivity, you might want to use a more stable type of cap, like a poly styrene or some such thing, in addition to replacing the crystal with better characteristics... i'm too lazy to go nuts over it all, so i just went with the cheapo ceramic disc caps... i bought a grab bag of them at my local frys electronics store...

if i had OCD, i'd probably try to solder up a small 32khz PLL synchronized to the 60 hz AC line and be done with it, but that would be overkill for my purposes...

Walmart has raised the price of the 513 to $249.88 and no longer allows you to see their inventory status. They did this for a long time at the beginning of sales... only let you enter "1" as qty of 513's but allowed big number for 515's. We'll see if that sticks till they run out.

Last known qty of 513's was 683 Mon morning, 2/27/12, and they were selling an avg of 70-80/day.

Walmart has raised the price of the 513 to $249.88 and no longer allows you to see their inventory status. For a long time at the beginning of sales, they did the same... only let you enter "1" as qty of 513's but allowed big number for 515's. We'll see if that sticks till they run out.

if i had OCD, i'd probably try to solder up a small 32khz PLL synchronized to the 60 hz AC line and be done with it, but that would be overkill for my purposes...

rgds,
ron g

Ron, for all the work you have done to get the channels from Cox and now with the clock, I think you may have a touch of the OCD bug. It's not a bad thing, I added the cap too and 99% (not 100%) of my channels are good.

This is still a good unit and I give it 5 stars for reliability, perhaps related to my lack of a valid PSIP and no clock signal. But we are still doing a lot of work that should not be required. Soon it will go the way of my Sony and eventually the after-market will dry up. It will take years. I hope by then there will be a product we can all enjoy. Anyhow, thank you for the clock fix.

Ron, for all the work you have done to get the channels from Cox and now with the clock, I think you may have a touch of the OCD bug. It's not a bad thing, I added the cap too and 99% (not 100%) of my channels are good.

This is still a good unit and I give it 5 stars for reliability, perhaps related to my lack of a valid PSIP and no clock signal. But we are still doing a lot of work that should not be required. Soon it will go the way of my Sony and eventually the after-market will dry up. It will take years. I hope by then there will be a product we can all enjoy. Anyhow, thank you for the clock fix.

FWIW, if there was an XDS clock source, I bet this box would use it.

hi joe...

thank you for your kind words...

i like this machine very much, actually, although it would be nice if they had done just a bit more thought with the design. having retired a few years ago from the electronics/communications field, i DO tend to get stir crazy for things to tinker with.

one of the last things i want to look at is to see if i can make the 513 main PCB function in the 3576 boxes if, for no other reason, to see if the 3576 can ultimately set its clock to a digital source. of course, a possible drawback might be that i'd have to use a Mag remote with the Philips boxes. not so sure i'd implement it permanently, though, since i have little faith in the stations' clock accuracy to begin with, and also the fact that i'm actually used to the philips remote, now, for editing, and find the mag remotes a bit clumsy to use... everyone's different though...